My Six-Day War

When I first heard "the word" in my hometown.

The fact that you’re reading this already indicates what a different world you live in from the one I inhabited in 1967. In 1967, I would never have been reading anything that had “Torah” in the title.

And of course, there was no such thing as websites, let alone Jewish websites.

Not only because of the simple absence in those environs of any Jews aside from us, and the Grohers on the other side of town, and – of course – all our relatives from New York, New Jersey and Long Island who showed up once a year on Thanksgiving. That was the holiday which afforded our extended family a sense of its ancient ties and religious identity: when the men sat down together to watch the Super-bowl on TV – turkey dinners balanced precariously on their laps; and when we cousins – second, third, and once and twice removed – put the Beatles on full-blast on the record player, getting our annual taste of joyful tribal communality; and down in the kitchen, the day our mothers and grandmothers and aunts and great aunts, in their aprons, would stand around talking and joking and cooking. The relatives’ names – Cantor, Goldblum, Lessack, Silberberg – declared blatantly (unlike my own nuclear family’s more neutral, passkey sort of name) which club had granted me free lifetime membership – the one I, along with Groucho, would never want to join.

Nor just because in that era, in the society in which I was raised, no publication identifying itself as Jewish would have ever found itself inside a mailbox alongside our home-delivered New York Times (the latter’s masthead with its Semitic-sounding names notwithstanding.) A hypothetical publication with a name such as Jewish Week, or The Jewish Observer, or (my goodness, what’s that?!) Mishpacha or even the Reform Jews’ Tikkun, would have had about as much chance of appearing locally as a neighbor showing up at the country club in yarmulke and payos for Saturday morning golf.

No, it was due to something else – related but distinct from the aforementioned practical impediments. In that world, the word, the word itself, was seldom uttered. It was an expression of the curious phenomenon which characterizes the Jewish experience, whereby nothing is heavier than something, and absence of the positive is not neutral, but negative. As has been said by the Hebrew University mathematician, Professor Eliyahu Rips, who got his atheistic upbringing in the staunchly Deity-free Soviet Union:

“The covenant creates ties and the ties are inescapable. If you do not make a force to make them positive they will manifest themselves in a negative way. The society will make you feel that you are connected to something negative. Then alienated Jews are escaping from the inescapable burden, time and time again repeating this Sisyphean torture, in escaping from Judaism. The rejection is because people feel themselves to be in the shadow of something negative against their will.”

In her final years, my mother on more than one occasion recalled ruefully that as a girl during the Depression, she’d dreamed of having children who wouldn’t be saddled with all the baggage of sorrow her own parents had had to carry through life. If they ever heard the kind of anti-Semitic epithet to which she and my father had been subjected as first-generation Americans, her completely assimilated offspring would be so far removed, she hoped, from the stigma that they’d turn around baffled and say, “Who? Me?”

By the time the baggage was passed on to me – heavy as it was – it was empty.

From a certain perspective, one could say my mother got her wish. Faigle’s granddaughter was no more knowledgeable about Jews, Judaism, Jewish history, and Jewish tradition than the Anglo-Saxon Protestant children who were my real companions, some of them beloved companions, along the tense journey through childhood. As it turned out, though, unexpectedly, I did inherit the baggage, no less than any heirloom intentionally bequeathed. But by the time it was passed on to me – heavy as it was – it was empty. Empty, and unopened, the baggage felt genuinely dangerous: an unstable cargo of unmentionable, volatile questions I didn’t want to ask, or have answered. I had no idea what was in there weighing me down, and wasn’t inclined to wonder, but the “inescapable burden” contained in that nothingness – which in other times and places, for other Jews, had constituted a specifically Jewish identity – was as onerous a load for a child to lug around as anything borne by her ancestors.

Who?

Me?

Then, one summer night, probably after a day spent enjoying myself in the country club’s turquoise-blue chlorinated pool, CBS Evening News brought into our living room a war in… Israel. About what? The details didn’t get my attention. Only that according to Walter Cronkite, the Jews had won.

I’d been aware, peripherally, that a Jewish country existed, but had never really heard anything specific.

This weird information reached me like some kind of weak light from a far-off star.

I’d never heard there was such a thing as historical Jewish victories, never heard what Chanukah signified, or Purim. The only image I’d ever associated vividly with the Jewish People was that they’d been gassed in concentration camps. My overriding emotion had always been a pervasive, unacknowledged, unarticulated, indefinable shame, and a real, though vague, all-embracing fear, and on top of all that, a load of guilt and self-contempt for feeling that way – guilt and self-contempt I couldn’t account for or construe. On some level I’d always known: I’m the opposite of courageous.

There was something else, in addition, that became indelibly associated in my mind with the 1967 War – even more potently, actually, than the war itself – carrying, as it did, a more immediate emotional resonance for me than anything going on in that obscure and distant land of pyramids called the Middle East.

It was something which in my childish heart I assumed – perhaps rightly – could happen only because of that Jewish victory in war, in its wake. It seemed part and parcel of this new, strange, positive idea about Jews that seemed to be suddenly rearing up its head.

An actress with brown eyes and brown hair (like me!) appeared sometime that same summer on the cover of The New York Times Magazine, by virtue of her starring role on Broadway in a production of…The Diary of Anne Frank. This actress – I suspected she wasn’t Jewish – was named Molly Perkins. I thought: she’s probably not. But she was playing…Anne Frank.

And even if she wasn’t… Anne Frank sure was.

All my childish envy had always been directed toward the blonde, blue-eyed girls at school. Now I stared at that photograph on the cover and was saturated with hopeless longing. She was so pretty, maddeningly so, yet Jewish…It amazed me. How I wished I could look like that.

This actress…this beautiful girl…by taking part in this play, was daring to associate herself with…

Me.

With…us.

Inside me, something shifted.

A brand new thought, a new notion, came into being. And though it didn’t take long for it to go back into hiding, overtaken again by nothingness, not to emerge again until the first time I saw Shabbat candles four years later, I dared to wonder who I was.

Visitor Comments: 7

Millie (not Molly) Perkins starred in the film version of The Diary of Anne Frank. Susan Strasberg was the star of the play on Broadway. (but yes, Ms. Perkins is not Jewish)

(6)
Kare Willis,
June 5, 2013 1:49 AM

Dairy of Anne Frank in my heart and soul.

I have read it so many times that I feel as if I am there with her ever time I read it. I feel like a part of me is her sounds strange but it is true

(5)
Jessica,
May 16, 2007 1:29 AM

Sarah, I so much relate to this article! I love your writing!!! Keep it up!

(4)
Marcia,
May 15, 2007 4:12 PM

Found this piece and 6 pages of your new book......needed it.Thank you!!

Yom Yerushalayim and so far from there......... my heart is in the East and I am still in Brooklyn. Thank you as usual.............

(3)
Robert Koorse,
May 13, 2007 5:15 PM

She makes me feel it...

Though my upbringing and experience in the 50's and 60's in Queens NY was somewhat different...I lived in a neighborhood with a great many Jewish families, Ms. Shapiro in some magical way captures how it must have felt to be an outsider, a person with a paradoxically strong heritage that was at the same time only weakly and in some ways reluctantly acknowledged. I suspect she has come a long way, and she certainly has me wanting to know more.

(2)
Anonymous,
May 13, 2007 12:58 PM

Welcome Home, Got that T Shirt, too.

Dear Mrs. Shapiro,

Thank you for the very moving and enlightening article. We are of the same generation, similar backgrounds with our only significant difference is I grew up in the South.

It is true; there is hidden intangible that points you toward the light. Hopefully, your article with help illuminate someone's way home.

(1)
Jack Schlatter,
May 13, 2007 11:32 AM

Where have you so many wise and objective AND talented writers..You all seem to have the ability to cut through the artifical garbage that dominates most of our national discourse and get to the HUMANITY of each issue..THANK YOU..Jack Schlatter

I just got married and have an important question: Can we eat rice on Passover? My wife grew up eating it, and I did not. Is this just a matter of family tradition?

The Aish Rabbi Replies:

The Torah instructs a Jew not to eat (or even possess) chametz all seven days of Passover (Exodus 13:3). "Chametz" is defined as any of the five grains (wheat, spelt, barley, oats, and rye) that came into contact with water for more than 18 minutes. Chametz is a serious Torah prohibition, and for that reason we take extra protective measures on Passover to prevent any mistakes.

Hence the category of food called "kitniyot" (sometimes referred to generically as "legumes"). This includes rice, corn, soy beans, string beans, peas, lentils, peanuts, mustard, sesame seeds and poppy seeds. Even though kitniyot cannot technically become chametz, Ashkenazi Jews do not eat them on Passover. Why?

Products of kitniyot often appear like chametz products. For example, it can be hard to distinguish between rice flour (kitniyot) and wheat flour (chametz). Also, chametz grains may become inadvertently mixed together with kitniyot. Therefore, to prevent confusion, all kitniyot were prohibited.

In Jewish law, there is one important distinction between chametz and kitniyot. During Passover, it is forbidden to even have chametz in one's possession (hence the custom of "selling chametz"). Whereas it is permitted to own kitniyot during Passover and even to use it - not for eating - but for things like baby powder which contains cornstarch. Similarly, someone who is sick is allowed to take medicine containing kitniyot.

What about derivatives of kitniyot - e.g. corn oil, peanut oil, etc? This is a difference of opinion. Many will use kitniyot-based oils on Passover, while others are strict and only use olive or walnut oil.

Finally, there is one product called "quinoa" (pronounced "ken-wah" or "kin-o-ah") that is permitted on Passover even for Ashkenazim. Although it resembles a grain, it is technically a grass, and was never included in the prohibition against kitniyot. It is prepared like rice and has a very high protein content. (It's excellent in "cholent" stew!) In the United States and elsewhere, mainstream kosher supervision agencies certify it "Kosher for Passover" -- look for the label.

Interestingly, the Sefardi Jewish community does not have a prohibition against kitniyot. This creates the strange situation, for example, where one family could be eating rice on Passover - when their neighbors will not. So am I going to guess here that you are Ashkenazi and your wife is Sefardi. Am I right?

Yahrtzeit of Rabbi Moses ben Nachman (1194-1270), known as Nachmanides, and by the acronym of his name, Ramban. Born in Spain, he was a physician by trade, but was best-known for authoring brilliant commentaries on the Bible, Talmud, and philosophy. In 1263, King James of Spain authorized a disputation (religious debate) between Nachmanides and a Jewish convert to Christianity, Pablo Christiani. Nachmanides reluctantly agreed to take part, only after being assured by the king that he would have full freedom of expression. Nachmanides won the debate, which earned the king's respect and a prize of 300 gold coins. But this incensed the Church: Nachmanides was charged with blasphemy and he was forced to flee Spain. So at age 72, Nachmanides moved to Jerusalem. He was struck by the desolation in the Holy City -- there were so few Jews that he could not even find a minyan to pray. Nachmanides immediately set about rebuilding the Jewish community. The Ramban Synagogue stands today in Jerusalem's Old City, a living testimony to his efforts.

It's easy to be intimidated by mean people. See through their mask. Underneath is an insecure and unhappy person. They are alienated from others because they are alienated from themselves.

Have compassion for them. Not pity, not condemning, not fear, but compassion. Feel for their suffering. Identify with their core humanity. You might be able to influence them for the good. You might not. Either way your compassion frees you from their destructiveness. And if you would like to help them change, compassion gives you a chance to succeed.

It is the nature of a person to be influenced by his fellows and comrades (Rambam, Hil. De'os 6:1).

We can never escape the influence of our environment. Our life-style impacts upon us and, as if by osmosis, penetrates our skin and becomes part of us.

Our environment today is thoroughly computerized. Computer intelligence is no longer a science-fiction fantasy, but an everyday occurrence. Some computers can even carry out complete interviews. The computer asks questions, receives answers, interprets these answers, and uses its newly acquired information to ask new questions.

Still, while computers may be able to think, they cannot feel. The uniqueness of human beings is therefore no longer in their intellect, but in their emotions.

We must be extremely careful not to allow ourselves to become human computers that are devoid of feelings. Our culture is in danger of losing this essential aspect of humanity, remaining only with intellect. Because we communicate so much with unfeeling computers, we are in danger of becoming disconnected from our own feelings and oblivious to the feelings of others.

As we check in at our jobs, and the computer on our desk greets us with, "Good morning, Mr. Smith. Today is Wednesday, and here is the agenda for today," let us remember that this machine may indeed be brilliant, but it cannot laugh or cry. It cannot be happy if we succeed, or sad if we fail.

Today I shall...

try to remain a human being in every way - by keeping in touch with my own feelings and being sensitive to the feelings of others.

With stories and insights,
Rabbi Twerski's new book Twerski on Machzor makes Rosh Hashanah prayers more meaningful. Click here to order...